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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n3<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Hetero<\/em> is about things being the way you want them. You seek possession, you imagine a scenario to strive for, you want to bend reality to your will.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Queer<\/em> is about coming to terms with what actually is. If we strip away all pretence, who am I? Who are we to each other? What is our relationship? What could we develop it into, without impositions, without framings, without labels?<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2018I\u2019ve fallen in love with you\u2019, one person says to another, and hetero<\/em> puts them on a set track. \u2018If you are in love, that means you want x<\/em>, y,<\/em> and z<\/em>. Now you\u2019ll do everything to achieve exactly that,\u2019 hetero<\/em> dictates. The other person, too, gets drawn into this scenario: if I\u2019ve been told that someone is in love with me, that implies x<\/em>, y,<\/em> and z<\/em>. That\u2019s the culture. That\u2019s common sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I often said that I didn\u2019t know what I wanted from people with whom I fell in love. Just to talk, to spend time together? To get to know them? There doesn\u2019t seem to be anything sexual about it, nor an absolute desire for a relationship \u2013 leaving what exactly?<\/p>\n\n\n\n The feeling I recognised as being in love often arose towards female friends with whom I simply got on well. Not knowing what I wanted from people often got me into trouble: for some reason, I felt I should share what was inside me with them. Sometimes I\u2019d confess, they\u2019d start thinking about these x<\/em>, y,<\/em> and z<\/em>, and our relationship would go sour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I had a friend called Lyuba, being with her, talking to her was intense, just like it was with you, bordering on the unhealthy. The war had just started, she and I were stranded in Moscow and spent a lot of time together. I remember we went to an exhibition of mummies and all sorts of Egyptian stuff at the Pushkin Museum \u2013 and I realised I was falling in love. I was walking along the rain-soaked street of my dacha village and recording a message for one of my friends about how I felt. It\u2019s like a cold, when you suddenly realise that something in your body has changed, and you know exactly what\u2019s coming next: your nose will run, you\u2019ll start sneezing, you might get a fever. A premonition, a first sign of the inevitable. All that\u2019s left is to surrender to the flow, turn on your back, and let it carry you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What was going on between me and Lyuba was not friendship. I don\u2019t know what it was. We were writing to each other all the time, telling each other everything about our lives, sharing the details that mattered. I tried to describe the beauty I saw around me. Life outside the city lent itself to this: I lived some of the time in my Moscow flat, but some on the suburban dacha, and saw plenty of greenery, all kinds of beasties, beetles on the road, wet tarmac, things that brought joy to my heart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I told her I was in love \u2013 and immediately felt how hetero<\/em> began to suffocate us. Lyuba distanced herself and started avoiding me. Perhaps she assumed me to follow that track. To pursue her. To demand ordinary, reciprocal love. To try embarking on a traditional romantic relationship. I\u2019m not sure I wanted any of that. In the end, we stopped talking to each other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thing don\u2019t always end badly, though: I confessed my love to Karina, and we\u2019re still friends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When I wrote to you that I\u2019d fallen in love, you asked me what I meant. It was four in the morning, I was lying in bed looking at my phone. And it was as if I had discovered a flower inside me. No one had ever asked me about it so directly before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I managed to put together some sort of a reply, and you agreed and said you understood that definition. I won\u2019t quote it here, it isn\u2019t that important. Definitions can change, desires can change, feelings can change. What mattered was that you asked the question at all. That a confession isn\u2019t followed by x<\/em>, y,<\/em> and z<\/em>, that mutual expectations can be discussed and clarified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was as if something had been maturing inside me for a long time; now it was slowly emerging from the ground, pushing its way through the thick grass of my soul. And no, it hadn\u2019t fully blossomed \u2013 I knew there was still a long way to go \u2013 but I had finally glimpsed it. A tiny flower was growing amongst the grass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Queer<\/em>, you said back then, grows within a person like a seed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was the night of 3\/4 June. Summer was just beginning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n By the third of June, I had spent seven months in Georgia. I had fled the war. I don\u2019t know how to talk about it, but I have to. It feels as though other people have the right to speak of the war, not me. I can only describe my own experience, how the war affected my life and the lives of my friends: we moved to another country, lost our roots and reference points, our hopes for any kind of stability. And yet the war was far away from us. That is the bitter truth. Russians in Tbilisi followed the news, donated money, wrote about the war, talked about the war, some of us volunteered locally and helped as best we could \u2013 but it was still far away. Even just physically.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I had left Moscow because, for me, it had become a phantom city. You stayed there, and later, when we started writing to each other, we talked about it, about the phantom city and you inside it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sure, I had left because Moscow had changed after the war began, because there was a danger they\u2019d take me away to kill people, because it had become difficult for me to live in a state that was waging such a senseless and brutal war. But these are rationalisations. What actually happened is that on one of my last days in Moscow, I went to see some of my favourite places, and they seemed like shadows to me. Like ghosts. The Black Cooperative coffeehouse. The Make Culture bar. The Forest caf\u00e9 by the Moscow Museum \u2013 I used to love coming there to work. Now, it\u2019s home to a mobilisation centre. Even the Maybe Coffee caf\u00e9 in a suburb, where Dasha and I would sometimes pop down in the mornings, was a ghost.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I didn\u2019t like writing down this explanation: it\u2019s an embarrassing truth and not the whole truth, either. Things are more complicated. I still have friends in Moscow, and for them, life has gone on, they are not among the ghosts and shadows. These words will hurt them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But that\u2019s what happens when your feelings for someone cool off \u2013 suddenly you see them in another light. Different people have different perspectives, and sometimes it\u2019s hard for us to understand one another. It\u2019s still the same city, sure, but for me, it\u2019s a ghost. That\u2019s the disconnect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [\u2026]<\/p>\n\n\n\n 23<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The title of the song \u2018Lovers Are Losers\u2019 says it all. I like the word \u2018loser\u2019, it doesn\u2019t strike me as offensive. Who ever said you have to win in life? That\u2019s just another hetero<\/em> thing. \u2018Winning\u2019s not why we\u2019re playing, that\u2019s the kinda neo-liberal bullshit that they\u2019re saying \u201closers\u201d\u2019, sings Molly Nilsson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve often been a loser in life. There\u2019s nothing shameful about that. I was a loser when my relationship with Dasha fell apart. I was a loser when I went to Georgia simply because I was tired. I was a loser when I fell in love with Tbilisi, where I had no chance of staying. I was a loser when I made close friends here and let them into my heart. I was a loser when I started getting to know you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you love, you\u2019ve already lost. Love can only end in a broken heart or death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Honestly, I think there\u2019s a great truth in this: if you live life to the full, if you open your heart, if you feel, if you need other people \u2013 you\u2019ve lost. Because life contains sadness, entropy, incongruity, a yearning that\u2019s hard to nail down but that remains ever-present in the shadows, that you can only overcome for a moment by acknowledging it and living in defiance of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the Dogtown in Tbilisi, amidst plastic beer cups, plates of chips, and young Georgians out to have some fun, \u2018Lovers Are Losers\u2019 sounded delightfully out of place. Every few weeks, when we made our way to that restaurant, I\u2019d pop a lari into the jukebox. That was my declaration: I love and I\u2019m a loser.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [\u2026]<\/p>\n\n\n\n 25<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n What kind of love did St. Peter feel for Jesus? Jesus\u2019 love for us is impossible to imagine, to grasp, to comprehend. Peter is easier to understand \u2013 he was a human being, just like us. My favourite moments in the Gospels are when the emotions break through. You have to look for them between the lines, of course: ancient language doesn\u2019t speak of feelings the way we do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the twenty-first and final chapter of the Gospel of John, the risen Jesus visits his disciples. Peter, who\u2019s been fishing, rows to the shore, they share a meal, and afterwards they talk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus asks Peter: \u2018Simon, son of John, do you truly love Me more than these?\u2019 \u2018Yes, Lord. You know that I love You,\u2019 Peter answers. In reply, Jesus says: \u2018Then feed my lambs.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then Jesus repeats his question, and Peter answers again that he loves Him. \u2018Then feed my lambs,\u2019 says Jesus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When Jesus asks him a third time, Peter is saddened and replies with anguish: \u2018Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.\u2019 And for the third time, Jesus says: \u2018Feed my lambs.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is a complex moment of emotional uncertainty. Shortly before this conversation, Peter betrays Jesus, denying him three times \u2013 it\u2019s hard not to see a parallel in Jesus demanding three confirmations of love. But on whose side should our feelings be? Does Peter deserve such treatment, or is Jesus being cruel?<\/p>\n\n\n\n The passage is full of mysteries. In the original Greek text, the dialogue goes like this: <\/p>\n\n\n\n When Jesus poses the question for the first time, He says: \u2018Do you truly \u1f00\u03b3\u03b1\u03c0\u1fb7\u03c2 Me more than they do?\u2019 Peter replies: \u2018I \u03c6\u03b9\u03bb\u03ad\u03c9 You.\u2019 The same thing happens the second time. Finally, the third time, Jesus asks: \u2018Do you \u03c6\u03b9\u03bb\u03b5\u1fd6\u03c2 Me?\u2019 And Peter replies: \u2018You know that I \u03c6\u03b9\u03bb\u03ad\u03c9 You.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n The first verb, \u1f00\u03b3\u03b1\u03c0\u03ac\u03b5\u03b9\u03bd, is derived from \u1f00\u03b3\u03ac\u03c0\u03b7, agape, meaning the highest, divine love \u2013 the love of God for man and of man for God. The second verb comes from \u03c6\u03b9\u03bb\u03af\u03b1, philia \u2013 brotherly love, the love found in close friendship. This is the love shared by best friends, generous and caring, striving to make one another happy. Does Jesus demand self-sacrificing divine love from Peter, yet on the third occasion stoops to his level and accepts his brotherly love and friendship?<\/p>\n\n\n\n When it comes to earthly, human love, the Bible is often confusing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I tried to think about being aroace through the prism of Christian love. Is this not the ideal of Christian love \u2013 a space without gender or boundaries, where everyone is equal and you demand nothing but only give? Is this not what complete liberation from hetero<\/em> looks like? I love you, God\u2019s creation, you are special to me, but I need nothing from you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Real human interactions turned out to be more complicated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [\u2026]<\/p>\n\n\n\n 46<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n My favourite work of art is The Lady and the Unicorn<\/em>, a series of tapestries from the late fifteenth century, housed in the Mus\u00e9e de Cluny in Paris.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These are six tapestries in the mille-fleurs (\u2018thousand flowers\u2019) style, on a pink-and-red background dotted with flowers. All the tapestries depict a noble lady surrounded by animals or servants, and in each one, she is engaged in another activity. There are many animals: a lion cub, a panther, a cheetah, a wolf, a fox, a dog, a goat, a rabbit, a monkey, and others. A unicorn appears in all the tapestries, hence the title.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The tapestry room is quiet and cool. The lighting is subdued, and visitors cast long shadows. For me, this room is a room of mystery. Something we cannot name aloud. Art always takes us out of the everyday and places us in another reality. The reality of The Lady and the Unicorn<\/em> is a space of refined beauty, whispers, nuances, and mystery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The origin of the tapestries is mysterious, too: there are various theories as to who made them and when, and no clear answer. For some time, they languished in obscurity. In 1841, they were discovered by Prosper M\u00e9rim\u00e9e at Ch\u00e2teau de Bussac, where they had suffered due to poor storage conditions. In 1844, the writer George Sand saw and described them. Incidentally, she was one of the first people to realise, because of the heroine\u2019s clothing, that The Lady and the Unicorn<\/em> must have been created in the fifteenth century. Until 1863, this is, until they were purchased by the curator of the Mus\u00e9e de Cluny, the tapestries continued to be stored in a damp and mouldy room.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Lady and the Unicorn<\/em> is undoubtedly an allegorical work, full of medieval symbols. But what exactly does it mean? The most common interpretation is that five of the six tapestries depict the five senses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The unicorn is looking into a mirror held out to him by the lady \u2013 this represents sight. The lady playing the organ stands for hearing. The lady taking a sweet out of a box is taste. Then smell, the lady weaving a wreath of carnations, whilst a monkey nearby is sniffing a flower. Finally, the tapestry in which the lady touches the unicorn\u2019s horn symbolises the tactile sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Which leaves us with the sixth and largest of the tapestries. In it, the lady stands in a garden before a tent bearing the inscription \u2018\u00e0 mon seul d\u00e9sir\u2019, flanked by a lion and a unicorn. She is placing a necklace, which she wears in the other tapestries, into a jewellery box. This is the only tapestry in which she smiles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What about \u2018\u00e0 mon seul d\u00e9sir\u2019? This medieval motto is deliberately obscure and ambiguous, translatable in various ways. For instance, as \u2018to my only love\u2019 or \u2018according to my sole desire\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The sixth sense, the feeling to which the tapestry is dedicated, is love. But what kind of love? Divine or human? Perhaps the lady is renouncing the other senses, the earthly pleasures depicted in the other tapestries of the series \u2013 and this is why she is putting away a precious ornament? Or is she actually taking it out of the box rather than putting it in? Is there a difference between d\u00e9sir as desire and d\u00e9sir as love? Perhaps love transcends all other emotions and is the only thing her soul desires?<\/p>\n\n\n\n To me, The Lady and the Unicorn<\/em> defies straightforward interpretation. These tapestries of unearthly beauty speak to us, but they do so in their own language. Any attempt to translate the message into the language of concepts is bound to lose something.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Every time I found myself in Paris, I would go to the Mus\u00e9e de Cluny as if spellbound. I\u2019d stand there and contemplate The Lady and the Unicorn<\/em>, even though I knew it so well that I could simply conjure it up in my mind. But that\u2019s not the same, of course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The lady\u2019s and her maid\u2019s exquisite costumes, the graceful interweaving of plants and animals, the rich, extraordinary colours \u2013 all frozen in reverent silence, an unspoken question hanging in the air, and no understanding ever comes, there is no moment when you comprehend love or find an answer. \u00c0 mon seul d\u00e9sir is \u00e0 mon seul d\u00e9sir.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [\u2026]<\/p>\n\n\n\n 70<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Low have a song called \u2018Nothing But Heart\u2019, which lasts eight minutes. Most of the lyrics consist of the repeating refrain \u2018I\u2019m nothing but heart\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Low were a Mormon couple from Minnesota, Alan and Mimi. They played minimalist, slow music, often with distorted guitars. They tended to address Christian themes in their songs \u2013 though not as in-your-face as what Americans tend to expect from \u2018Christian rock\u2019. But they mentioned God as well as the themes of love and the transcendent, viewed through the prism of Christianity. Sometimes, they were quite direct: for instance, they have a Christmas song, \u2018Long Way Around the Sea\u2019, which is wonderful at capturing the mystical, quiet, sacred essence of the holiday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2018Nothing But Heart\u2019 is my favourite song by Low, I guess. I remember hearing it at a concert in a Lutheran church in the Swedish city of Gothenburg over ten years ago. The audience sat on wooden benches; the lights were dimmed so that the musicians were barely visible \u2013 and the church\u2019s vast acoustic space was filled with the sound of guitars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For me, this song is about blurring the boundaries between romantic love, Christian love, and the love between friends, about these loves all being one and the same. Alan Sparhawk repeats the words \u2018I\u2019m nothing but heart\u2019 meaning that all we are is love. At the end, his wife, Mimi Parker, joins in, singing \u2018All we are is what we love\u2019. The song\u2019s final lines are on an altogether new, sacred level: \u2018And as you wear the gown that\u2019s made of gold and white, may we someday be assured as we walk into the night\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These lines mean a lot to me. They clearly refer to death and the Last Judgement, to the end of everything. The image is unmistakable \u2013 people dressed in heavenly garments are striding toward A Place Beyond the Boundaries, beyond the horizon of Bruegel\u2019s Hunters in the Snow<\/em>, and all that will remain to give us hope and faith is love. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Because every love contains this joyful and terrifying, innermost, unfathomable, unnamable thing. The thing that lifts the veil of reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Two days after I arrived in Georgia, Mimi Parker died. Alan Sparhawk disbanded Low. I tried and couldn\u2019t imagine what it must have been like: to have a partner for many years, to play in a band with her, to lose her, and be left alone with songs saying that our world is temporary, that everything that matters awaits There, and that we will carry our love with us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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